The spokesman of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Lagos State, Mr. Joe Igbokwe, has expressed concern that Igbo traders in markets across the state are taking laws into their hands.
He made the observation at the weekend in an interview with Sahara TV. Igbokwe said that reports on the Oladipo Market crisis had been on the desk of Governor Babatunde Fashola for over two years but that the Igbo people in that market had festered the crisis by refusing to listen to or respect the committee set up by the government to look into the matter.
“We need to do something to bring order to our markets in Lagos. Our people are taking laws into their hands. No responsive and responsible government will take the kind of insult and audacity our people are displaying in Lagos. They don’t want to obey constituted authorities. And it is not only in Oladipo (Market).
“I’ve been embarrassed at what is happening in our markets. Nearly all our markets in Lagos are endangered with a deep crisis of leadership,” Igbokwe lamented.
Reacting to a recent deportation of some destitute of Igbo extraction to their home-state by the Lagos government, Igbokwe explained that the Lagos State Government has always been proactive in taking care of its most destitute inhabitants and that it had been ensuring that the impoverished were treated with decency and cleaned up.
However, he defended that the state government has a duty to its residents to ensure that public safety in the commercial metro is maintained at all times.
“What is happening in Lagos concerns security issues and Lagos is just trying to be proactive…we have seen situations where people pretending to be selling oranges turn out to be bomb throwers,” Igbokwe cited.
He expressed displeasure over attempts to politicise the deportation issue, stressing that there was the need to “look at the bigger picture and consider the situation the Lagos State Government was put in, a predicament that somewhat justified the hard decision” to deport
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